Plant Vogtle

Plant Vogtle 3 & 4

Plant Vogtle units 3 and 4 will be the first new nuclear units built in the United States in the last three decades. As construction continues, Georgia Power remains focused on completing Vogtle units 3 and 4 with safety and quality as top priorities. Once complete, Vogtle units 1-4 will produce enough safe, reliable, affordable electricity to power 1 million Georgia homes and businesses.

Who was Alvin Vogtle?

The Vogtle Electric Generating Plant is named for Alvin W. Vogtle Jr., past Chairman of the Board of Southern Company. He was elected President of Southern Company in 1969, Chief Executive Officer in 1970 and Chairman of the Board in 1983.

The discipline and determination which characterized Mr. Vogtle’s work at Southern Company were defined during World War II after he was captured by the Germans and made a prisoner of war. During 26 months of confinement, he tried to escape on five separate occasions. On his sixth attempt, he reached the Swiss border, scaled a 15-foot-high barbed wire fence, and crossed the Rhine River to Switzerland and freedom. In 1963, United Artists produced “The Great Escape,” a film which was based in part on Mr. Vogtle’s war-time experiences.

After being captured in North Africa, Lt. Vogtle was transported to a prisoner-of-war camp in the heart of Germany. He escaped after six months of imprisonment, but he was recaptured in the Czechoslovakian town of Bakov.

From Luft Stalag III, he made three more unsuccessful escape attempts. Then, on January 27, 1945, the Germans evacuated the camp and sent the prisoners by boxcar to Moosburg, Germany. Lt. Vogtle escaped from the train but was recaptured in Dunharr. He was sent to Moosburg for imprisonment but, in only a few weeks, he made his sixth and final escape through southern Germany to Diepoldsau, Switzerland.